TRP: Ba'ob, Goro, and Hansel (Returning Gem)
ABBY The Castle, day 253 Ba'ob slipped through the castle, watching, listening for signs of other people. So far, nobody. This was good. He'd asked to come along with Jasper in her latest trip to the castle. Had to return something. The amber gem Ombre'd given him was tucked in a pouch on his hip. Wouldn't be for long. The wolf padded along by his side as he safely made it into the book-room. Nobody was there-- not even Ombre. Ba'ob felt a pang of sadness-- but it was better this way. He tucked the gem out of sight, but where he knew she'd find it, and then turned to leave. LINA Theo had made a demand for "a book with sharks and maybe also poisonous snakes," and Goro promised her he'd do his level best to find her one, though he wasn't optimistic. This might be a special order kinda deal. Nonetheless, he was gonna try the library first. When he got there, he saw Ba'ob. Looking for Ombre, Goro guessed. "Hey," Goro said, with a quick wave. "Uh, she's out. Should be back soonish, though." ABBY Ba'ob flinched. Was that one elf, again. He reached for the wolf-- stump grazing against fur. Right. Ba'ob ducked his head, taking a few steps back, staring at the ground. No eye contact. "Yes sir," he said softly. Grasped what was left of his forearm in his hand. Ba'ob could leave now-- hadn't been given permission to-- Ba'ob belonged to Azriel not him-- he might not care about that-- Too many thoughts were swirling around his brain. Ba'ob couldn't figure them out. Felt stuck. Waiting to see what the elf'd say or do. LINA Yes sir? Holy shit. Goro's mouth fell open a little. Gigantic fucking difference from the last time he'd seen the kid in the castle. Made him kinda fucking sad, if he was being honest. He gestured to Ba'ob's stump. "How's that been healing up? You in any pain, or anything?" ABBY His arm was off. Course it hurt. Sometimes where it wasn't, any more. Head down, face blank. Don't let him see the resentment. "It's been healing up fine, sir. No pain," Ba'ob said. IZZY Hansel heard voices -- one of them Goro's, the other definitely not Ombre's -- and looked up from his maps. He leaned to peer over to the library and saw that elf kid -- the fuckin' weird one. Right, he was pals with Ombre, or something. Must've come to visit her. He winced a little, at the arm. Shame the little healing spell he'd picked up couldn't do anything about that. Luci couldn't even fix it, and neither could Goro. Someone at the Sanctuary, maybe -- Amari? Goro probably would've asked her. It just broke Hansel's heart a bit, seeing the kid so fucked up. He wished he could do something about it. He wandered over anyway, crossing the stairs and coming to a stop next to Goro to drape an arm around his shoulders. He raised the other hand to the kid, quietly. LINA Goro clasped the hand Hansel had put around him, and kept eyeing Ba'ob. Kid wasn't doing a great job of acting like he felt fine. "Sometimes, when people lose a limb, a weird thing happens." Kept his voice light and easy, not wanting to sound all grave about it. "They can still feel it every now and then. All achy, or tingly like it fell asleep. Phantom pain, they call it. Like the ghost of an arm." He watched to see how Ba'ob responded to that. ABBY Ba'ob glanced up just enough to see the stupid orc joining them. Felt his shoulders start to hunch up. Forced himself to stop, back to staring at the floor. Had to be boring. Empty. No more personality than the table. "I'm fine, sir." Hand gripped tighter around what was left of his arm. It ached. Ba'ob could almost feel himself making a fist, working the ache out. Almost. "No pain." IZZY Hansel winced, again. Poor kid. He'd gotten real fucked up -- more than the arm thing. "Hey, uh," he said gently. "You don't gotta call anyone sir, y'know?" Or lie about being hurt, for that matter, but that might be a harder sell. ABBY Ba'ob felt himself tensing up again. Wrong. Wished stupid orc was right but... he wasn't. Ba'ob hadn't wanted to call people 'sir'. Had viciously refused to. But he was a wild animal that needed taming. Or to accept that he'd already been tamed. Couldn't tell him that though. Couldn't disagree with-- people like them. "I understand, sir." Wished wolf was on his other side. He could sink his hand into her fur if she was, feel more grounded. But she was sitting just an inch from his leg, watching the two with her ears perked and happy. Had the strangest sense of who she liked. LINA Shit. Goro kept thinking, I must have a spell for this, but he sure fucking didn't. Wasn't any kind of Restoration that could get someone's head back on straight after it'd been screwed with bad enough. He squeezed Hansel's hand tighter. "Hey, where you staying these days? Azriel's place?" ABBY Ba'ob nodded. Finally an easy question. And he shouldn't but-- he looked up just a bit. "I belong to him." Didn't belong to them. Not anybody else. Azriel. IZZY Hansel narrowed his eyes. LINA "Ah." Disturbing way of putting it, but given the way Ba'ob said it with a hint of relief in his voice, Goro figured it was safe to assume nothing sinister was going on. "He's taking good care of you, yeah?" ABBY Ba'ob nodded again, and this time didn't immediately look back down. (They hadn't hurt him last time. Maybe there'd be enough warning for Ba'ob to back off, if he did do something.) "Keeps me safe," he said. Hugged his missing arm to his chest. "Lets me do stuff. It's better than I deserve." IZZY "Ah, hey," Hansel tried. "Hey. Nah. You deserve to be safe and fuckin' ... allowed to do stuff, kid. I bet fuckin' uh, Azriel would say that too," he guessed wildly. ABBY "He does," Ba'ob agreed softly. Azriel liked to tell him things like that. That he deserved to be happy. Deserved to have fun. Deserved to be his own person. Made Ba'ob want to cry sometimes. Azriel was so wrong but it sounded so nice. LINA Goro grimaced a little, still not sure what to do about any of this. Wasn't really anything he could do for the arm at this point, and healing was about the only thing he could offer half the time. Well, there was one other thing that might help. "Hey, uh. Ombre. Pretty fox lady. You want me to call her for you?" Goro lifted up the whistle he wore around his neck. ABBY Ombre. Here. "No!" Ba'ob cried out. Too strong. Too demanding. He curled in on himself, digging his nails into his arm. "Please don't," he said, softer. "There's no need." LINA "I think she'd like to see you," Goro pressed, carefully. "She's worried about you. Misses having you around." ABBY Ba'ob shook his head. "You can tell her I'm..." How was he, really? Alive. Safe-ish. Not happy, but that was expected. "Okay," he settled on. "Shouldn't miss me. Shouldn't worry." IZZY Hansel frowned. Ombre seemed real fucking sweet when it came to just about anyone but him. He didn't much doubt she'd miss the little weirdo and be worried about him. "What if, uh. We tell her you came by?" he suggested. "And if she wants to come visit you, she can, yeah? She knows where you're staying at?" ABBY Ba'ob nodded. Yeah, Ombre knew. Maybe she would turn up. Give Ba'ob hugs, tell him she wasn't mad at him. Sounded nice. Didn't deserve it but... still sounded nice. "She... can," he said softly. "If she wants. " Ba'ob shouldn't-- couldn't ask her to. But Ombre was a free lady, she could go where she wanted. LINA Well, that was encouraging, at least. "Yeah. I'm telling you, she'll fuckin' want, kid. Hell, I bet she'll drop by tomorrow." ABBY Ba'ob shifted restlessly. Tomorrow. "That's really soon," he said quietly. Would he be ready? By the time Ombre showed up would he be able to resist the urge to hide and avoid here? Maybe. IZZY "Too soon?" Hansel hazarded. Guessed the kid had to be feeling pretty fucking guilty about what he'd done -- what he'd been made to do. Hansel could get him not feeling like he could face Ombre yet. ABBY "Ombre can do what she wants," Ba'ob said quickly. If he had any choice he'd tell her to stay away. It'd be better for her. But he didn't. So whenever she showed up-- Ba'ob just have to deal with it then. LINA "Uh, well, probably what she wants is for you to be okay, so, uh..." Goro gave the whistle another shake and dropped it. "I'll tell her to give you a couple days, so it's not too fast for you." IZZY Kid still looked nervous, but Hansel guessed all they could do was offer. Maybe Ombre could make him feel better, or that Azriel fucker would be able to help him. Hansel just felt fucking powerless to do anything, himself. Maybe it was because Ba'ob was about Jonn's size and clearly weird and stabby, but he kept just wanting to scoop him up and squeeze him to make him feel better. Was pretty sure that might just traumatize the kid worse, though. Dammit. "Hey, uh, you hungry, kid?" he tried, because that was the only other thing he could think of. "I got some stew goin' down in the kitchen, if you want a hot meal." Real careful to not tell, even though that was what came more naturally to him -- insisting that people let him take care of them. Seemed important to try to give Ba'ob a choice, even if he didn't quite realize he had it. ABBY Ba'ob shifted restlessly. Kept talking about Ombre-- and now offering food-- interacting with these people was stressful. Wolf looked happy though. Looked half ready to trot on over and say hi. Only wasn't cause she could tell Ba'ob needed her close. He kept staring at the ground, rubbing his arm. Now was offering food. Probably keep sticking around too. Suffocating Ba'ob under lots of attention. Wanted to snarl, bite, make them leave. Couldn't though. And if he was stuck anyway... maybe food would be okay? They'd promised no hits. And Ba'ob still wasn't convinced, but he was behaving now. Knew how to avoid it. "Okay," he said quietly. Looked up slightly, enough to watch them move. IZZY Hansel nodded. It was so fucking hard to tell if the kid actually wanted anything or was just trying to appease him, but he decided to just go with it and quietly led the way downstairs, to the kitchen. The wolf seemed pretty happy, at least. Hansel wondered if there was some kinda druid shit he could do and talk to her, or something. The Lady had said he was a fuckin' child -- maybe he couldn't do it yet, but he'd be able to later. The kitchen smelled fucking great. He'd started the stew that morning, chopping up carrots and celery, garlic and onions, a nice handful of herbs. Raef had taken care of boiling some chicken and shredding it up separately, for the rest of the castle, and Hansel remembered Ba'ob being a fan of meat, so he fixed a bowl with plenty of it, setting it at the table and pulling a chair out, then going back and making a bowl to sit on the floor for the wolf, too. ABBY Ba'ob glanced at the spot set for him, at Hansel briefly, and then at a corner, and then back at the chair. The wolf has no such hesitations-- licking the orc's hand before diving into her bowl. Ba'ob thought about it a second and eased into the offered chair, keeping a wary eye on the two others in the room. Wasn't supposed to sit, while they weren't. Usually. The orc seemed to want him to though. So Ba'ob watched to see if they was gonna get mad about it. Didn't though. So he carefully picked up his spoon and set to the chore that was eating. Stupid cuff, getting left on his right hand. Doing things with the left was always more awkward. IZZY Hansel winced a little, seeing the kid have to eat with his non-dominant hand. He kind of fucking forgot that was a problem people had. Figured it'd be the stronger one that got fucking cut off. He wondered fleetingly if that was why the cuff'd been put on that arm. He wondered, a bit, why this cuff was different from Mishka's. What made Mishka's so fucking special, anyway. He got another bowl and held it up to Goro questioningly. LINA Goro eyed Ba'ob, eyed the bowl Hansel was offering, then shrugged and nodded. When Hansel had dished him up, he leaned against the wall to eat, close to the table but not sitting at it. Fuckin' weird, but sure. IZZY Once Goro had a bowl, Hansel dropped a bit more chicken down for the wolf -- there was a gracious fuckin' dinner guest, god knew -- and pulled a thick ceramic carafe with a cork lid and fur padding on the outside out of a high cabinet, and filled it with stew, as well, pressing the lid in firmly to keep it warm. He took it over to the table along with a glass of water to sit next to the kid, tapping the carafe with a finger. "Take some for the road, or whatever, eh? You can bring the dish back whenever. Or Ombre can after she visits." He wanted to pat Ba'ob's shoulder, and almost did before thinking better of it and pulling his hand back. He fixed himself a bowl, instead, and sat not right next to the kid but near him to eat quietly. It was something, he guessed. ABBY The orc reached for him and Ba'ob froze. He'd been good he'd behaved he knew he shouldn't have let them bring him-- and then the orc pulled back. No hits. Just... more food. Ba'ob eyed the jar for a second before slowly reaching out and pulling it closer. Sounded... okay. Jasper could bring back too. If they didn't break it. Just have to be careful. And go back to eating, trying not to think about the orc close enough to break him. ABBY END Title: Returning Gem Summary: Ba'ob goes back to the castle to return the gem Ombre gave him. Hansel and Goro happen across him and attempt parenting. Are not entirely successful. Category:Text Roleplay